A lot of people are highly ignorant to how losing their phones to fraudsters can lead to a complete clean-up of their bank accounts.

If you ask any banker, he or she will tell you about the hundreds of customers who have often come crying to the banks for help after realising that the money in their bank accounts have either fallen short of what it should be or has hit red.

These frudsters do this by stealing victims’ identity; name, address, bank information which they use in gaining access to their bank aacounts. They also use the stolen identity to defraud other people and even apply for loans, leaving the victim with debts.

A local fraudster arrested by the Police confesses to how he steals money from people’s bank accounts through their SIM cards. He claims he does “Wire Wire” also called SIM transaction or “Joker wire” where he can unlock, transfer and withdraw from any SIM card that is linked to a bank account.

In a video posted on Twitter by Jubril Gawat, the Senior Special Assistant (SSA) on New Media to the Governor of Lagos State, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, the arrested fraudster confessed that once he gets hold of such a phone, he gains access to it easily by dialing the code, *425*100# to reveal the bank account connected to the SIM card.

For example, if it is an Access Bank aacount, he will dial *901*00# to show the users account balance. He will then proceed to reset the PIN, and the bank will ask for the account number and date of birth of the account holder. Since a lot of people save their account number on their contact list, He can easily get it there.

He will then proceed to use the account number to get the victim’s BVN, then use the BVN to get all his/her details by dialing *565*0#. With this information, he will proceed to reset the PIN, then use the date of birth to create a new PIN. From there, he will be able to transfer money out of the account.

He explains further that if the SIM card owner is a salary earner or owns a salary account, he will be eligible to apply for loans. As long as it’s the SIM used to receive bank account alerts, he can hack it. He does it so efficiently that the main owner of the account will receive no alert on any transactions done.

He transfers the stolen money to a “No trace Account” (Aza) using another stolen sim with its BVN to create it,
so the new account will be used to receive the funds and the owner of that stolen SIM card will be the one that will be traced.

Even if he does not see a SIM to use, as long as he can get the BVN, he can use it to receive the funds.

It can be tough to keep up with the many vices of internet fraudsters, who are constantly changing their techniques to keep ahead of the authorities. Being a victim of fraud can affect people of any age, and it can cost a lot of money.

We have valuable information we let out easily, but unconsciously. And there are people out there waiting to get hold of such information. It is advisable to always be careful of where and how we store our personal information.

Social media giant, Twitter has announced the launch of a voice content app for use mainly on iOS. Several users have been invited to join the Spaces feature for testing so far.

Twitter disclosed this in a statement on Wednesday announcing product updates and then during a Q&A session for the Spaces feature.

“Spaces is a place to come together, built around the voices of the people using Twitter, your Twitter community. Spaces are live for as long as they’re open; once ended, they will no longer be available publicly on Twitter,” Twitter said.

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It added that the feature would be rolled out to a select few to learn and gather feedback from a variety of communities on Twitter.

“While anyone on iOS will be able to join a Space, only people in the small group will be able to create Spaces. We will expand the list of people who can create Spaces over time,” Twitter added.

READ: Twitter considers paying its staff in Bitcoin

What you should know 

• Twitter is not the only social media giant working on a Clubhouse competitor. Nairametrics reported that Facebook is creating an audio chat similar to the popular audio chat app, Clubhouse.

Google announced a new feature for Android phones that will allow you to schedule text messages to send at a later time and date.

This new feature will be available on Android 7 or newer versions of Android. You also need to have the latest version of Google Messages to enjoy this feature.

This new feature will allow you to compose a message ahead of time, whenever it’s convenient for you, then schedule it to be sent later when it’s a more appropriate time.

READ: Here’s why Huawei’s ‘HarmonyOS’ won’t be replacing ‘Android’ anytime soon

According to Google, over half a billion people across the world use Messages to seamlessly and safely connect with family, friends, and others every month so this feature can be particularly helpful especially if you have friends, family, or coworkers, and colleagues at other times zones.

To use this feature, Download the latest version of Google Messages

• Open Google Messages on your Android phone and choose who you want to send a message to.
• Create your text.
• Tap and hold the send button (instead of just tapping it).
• A schedule menu pops up. Choose when you’d like to send it — either later today, later tonight, tomorrow, or a date and time in the future.

READ: Google threatens to remove its search engine from Australia due to media code

That’s it. you’ll see a confirmation that it’s a scheduled message that won’t arrive at the recipient until your chosen date and time.

Other features released for Android includes a new password checkup tool available on devices running on Android 9 and above that lets you know if the password you used has been previously exposed and what to do about it, along with other improvements to products like its screen reader TalkBack for the visually impaired.

READ: Google, Facebook, Twitter stocks drop, investors ponder if big techs have become too powerful

More intuitive gestures, a unified menu, a new reading control menu have been added to TalkBack, Dark theme on Google Maps, Assistant, and Android Auto.